Life With a Blind Appaloosa

Author: Ellie

No real updates about Lace. I have been busy at work and working on finishing some schooling. I have been doing a lot of reading about clicker training from Alexandra Kurland’s blog at The Clicker Center. I’m eager to put what I’ve learned into practice. The challenge is adapting certain methods to a blind horse! Lacey… Continue reading Busy

Retirement With old injuries and not so great conformation, I struggled with riding Lacey. It was always a fight, it was uncomfortable for both of us, she just couldn’t relax and work over her back, and we were both frustrated all the time. So, I decided to find a retirement home for her. I stated,… Continue reading Too Stubborn for Blindness

Clicker training is a method of positive reinforcement using a clicker to mark the desired behaviour and bridge that behaviour to the reward. This is the most basic description, of course, but there is much more to this method. I find it to be an easy-to-understand (for the animal) method of training and doesn’t require… Continue reading Clicker Training

GravelProofHoof – Magnesium for Horses A new friend of mine has been following my issues with Lacey. She suggested a magnesium supplement could help. I had heard of it before, but also that it only works if the horse is deficient. It isn’t, of course, a magic potion. However, I went ahead and read into… Continue reading Magnesium for Horses

She’s pretty, that’s for sure. She’s also often a huge pain in the backside. She does not load or tie, she often dislikes grooming, knows her name, but does not come to see you at the gate. People call Appaloosas stubborn, and we appaloosa people try to defend our breed, but the others are usually… Continue reading Appaloosas Are Stubborn

Well, I had a very enlightening clinic this weekend with Kenneth Vansweevelt of Belgium. We learned about allowing your horse to make a connection with you, instead of forcing one. The horse is invited to communicate with the handler or rider, and the rider responds by allowing. It really does becomes like dancing. They are… Continue reading The (Academic) Art of Riding

This weekend, there will be an Academic Art of Riding clinic where we board. I am quite interested in what we’ll learn regarding theories and practice. There are some differences between this and Philippe Karl’s Ecole de Legerete methods, but in essence, much is very similar. The focus is on alignment (particularly of the spine),… Continue reading Academic Art of Riding